Conaway speaks to Midlanders at town hall meeting

Joseph Basco

Published 4:30 pm, Monday, March 11, 2013

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With 11 days into the national sequestration, U.S. Rep. Mike Conaway, R-Texas, met with Midlanders in a town hall meeting at the Polo Park Estates retirement home to discuss the automatic federal spending cuts and the Texas-relevant issue of immigration.

"It's a step in the right direction in the sense of reducing the size of government," Conaway said. "There are better ways to get at it, but the president and Senate won't agree to those things, so this is a step that we're having to take."

Conaway said that even though the 10-year sequestration will be in effect this year, he predicts Congress will approve a law that will replace the hard sequestration cuts with softer, smarter cuts for the remaining nine years.

"As long as the House is controlled by the Republicans, we're not going to eliminate it," Conaway said. "We may vote to substitute more better, thoughtful spending cuts for the sequester cuts, but we're not going to eliminate it."

Immigration, a long-standing bipartisan issue, was the other political topic audience members inquired about the most.

One audience member asked about securing the border, another asked about taxing illegal immigrants.

Conaway said it is important to enhance border security with technology that can detect underground tunnels at the U.S. and Mexico border. Regarding taxing undocumented immigrants, Conaway avoided answering the question and instead listed his proposals for immigration law, such as a guest worker program, and emphasized the need for compromise if immigration law is to be passed.

Conaway said immigration law is at the stage where it has to go through committees. He said Speaker of the House John Boehner will use the Judiciary Committee to develop the language of the law.

"Until they release any committee version, we really don't know the specifics of what the House bill will be," he said.